The couple’s two sons were spending the night at their grandparents’ house, leaving the apartment unusually quiet.
After dinner, the husband leaned back with a glass of beer while his wife scrolled through her phone.
“Our older son said something interesting the other day,” she said. “He wants to be a YouTuber when he grows up.”
“A YouTuber?” Her husband laughed. “How are you raising them? Only a tiny fraction of creators make a reliable living from video platforms. And once you start publishing, there are copyright problems, privacy issues, advertising rules, music licenses…”
“When I asked what he wanted to make videos about, he said, ‘I don’t know.’”
“Hahaha. He’s already run out of ideas.”
His wife smiled.
“Maybe. But I still want to support him.”
“Support him in becoming an influencer?”
“Not necessarily. I want him to learn the skills behind it.”
She put down her phone.
“Recording a video is the easy part now. A child can make a decent-looking clip with a smartphone. The harder skills are understanding how information moves through networks, how platforms recommend content, how accounts are secured, how digital identities work, and how to tell what information is trustworthy.”
Her husband nodded.
“You mean digital literacy.”
“More than that. Media literacy, too. If he eventually publishes videos, he needs to understand copyright and licensing. He needs to know that someone appearing in the background can raise privacy issues. He needs to recognize scams and phishing attempts. And if he uses generative AI, he should understand that generating an image or voice doesn’t automatically give him the right to use someone else’s identity.”
“That sounds like a lot for a kid who doesn’t even know what his channel would be about.”
“That’s exactly why I’d rather teach him the fundamentals than tell him to become an influencer.”
The husband took another sip.
“You know, you’re right about one thing. Almost every job is becoming dependent on networks. Cloud systems, authentication, collaboration software, AI tools…”
“Exactly. He doesn’t have to become a YouTuber. But he should understand the environment he’s growing up in.”
Her husband smiled.
“I suppose I could teach him something.”
“What?”
“How not to click suspicious links.”
“You’re the one who clicked that fake delivery message last month.”
He laughed.
“That’s why I’m qualified.”
Just then, the wife’s smartphone rang.
She glanced at the screen.
“Oh, look.”
Her expression changed.
“It’s Dad. He’s making a video call.”
Her husband raised an eyebrow.
“At this hour?”
She answered.
The screen filled with her father’s face.
Behind him, their older son was sitting at the kitchen table, holding a smartphone horizontally.
“Mom!” the boy shouted. “Grandpa says my camera settings are wrong!”
The husband laughed.
“See? Your YouTube career has already begun.”
The boy shook his head.
“I’m not making a video. I’m trying to figure out how Grandpa’s phone connects to the Wi-Fi.”
His parents looked at each other.
The wife smiled.
“That’s even better.”
On the screen, her father raised his hands helplessly.
“I told him I was just trying to call you.”
The boy frowned at the router.
“Grandpa, your Wi-Fi password is written on a piece of paper next to the computer.”
Everyone became silent.
The husband slowly lowered his glass.
“Okay,” he said. “First lesson.”
“What lesson?” the boy asked.
“Never show your Wi-Fi password on camera.”
The boy thought for a moment.
“Why?”
His mother smiled.
“Because someday, you might understand exactly why.”
And for the first time that evening, nobody mentioned YouTube.
All names of people and organizations appearing in this story are pseudonyms
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